Sask. experts give advice on helping bees in and out of cities | 24CA News
After a chilly winter, bees are exhibiting themselves in yards and lawns as summer time approaches.
Bees’ function as pollinators make them integral to ecosystems, however sadly they face risks starting from pesticides to pathogens.
Graham Parsons, Saskatchewan’s pollinator biosecurity specialist, spoke with Stefani Langenegger on 24CA News’s Blue Sky, with a spotlight on what folks can do to assist bees.
Parsons stated that when you spot an enormous fuzzy bee flying near the bottom presently of the 12 months, it’s most probably a queen on the lookout for a nest.
“They’re kind of perusing the ground under leaf litter and things for, probably, old mouse nests,” stated Parsons. “Most of them are nesting in the ground, so old mouse nests or ground squirrel burrows.”
Blue Sky50:32How will we make our yards extra pleasant to bees and different pollinators?
Today visitor host Stefani Langenegger was joined by Saskatchewan’s Pollinator Biosecurity Specialist Graham Parsons to show us about bees. We realized about tips on how to help them and what most threatens these necessary pollinators. We had been additionally joined by Sarah Wood from the U of S veterinary division. She is learning the relationships between spray on crops and bee well being.
To entice the queen to remain, Parsons stated residents could make tiny properties for them proper on the garden. These are much like birdhouses, however on the bottom and with an entrance sufficiently small to forestall a mouse from nesting inside.
“Upholsterers cotton is good to put in there,” he stated. “It looks like a mouse nest and they can kind of build their nest out of that, but that’s depending on how much time or effort you want to put into it.”
Another tip was for folks attempting to kill wasps, however not bees. Parsons stated you shouldn’t use a very candy substance as bait, as a result of bees may also be attracted. Rotting meat is a perfect different.
Sarah Wood, an affiliate professor within the division of veterinary pathology on the University of Saskatchewan, research infectious and bacterial ailments in honey bees.
She stated she misplaced about 50 per cent of her analysis colonies over the winter. Wood needed to supply bees from across the province and had a number of queens shipped from Hawaii.
Overall, she is not too involved about bee farm populations and stated, “beekeepers can meet the challenge because they have done so in the past.” But wild pollinators just like the honey bee want extra consideration, she stated.
“We know that 95 per cent of the canola that’s grown in Saskatchewan is grown from seed that’s treated with a neonicotinoid insecticide,” stated Wood.
“Those insecticides are incredibly important for farmers to control the flea beetle and other pests that might that might feed on there all the crops, but at the same time, we know that these neonicotinoid insecticides can have negative effects on honey bees, so we just need to establish what that safe dose range is.”
A attainable resolution is a program referred to as Drift Watch, which permits beekeepers to register their colonies so native farmers know the place the colonies are and may higher time their pesticide software.
